Looking to get much more out of your virtualized environment? Combine the power of HP StoreVirtual VSA with Microsoft or VMware virtualization. With HP StoreVirtual VSA, you can amplify your existing server virtualization investments by using internal and direct-attached disks for shared storage purposes.

The first software-defined virtual storage appliance to support all major industry-standard servers and multiple hypervisors, HP StoreVirtual VSA has a proven 6-year track record with more than 150,000 VSAs distributed.

Technical Specifications

Specifications are provided by the manufacturer. Refer to the manufacturer for an explanation
of the print speed and other ratings.

Software

Bundled Support:

3 Years 9x5 Support

License Category:

License

License Qty:

Up to 10 TB capacity

License Type:

License

Service

Support Details Full Contract Period:

3 years

Header

Brand:

HPE

Compatibility:

PC

Manufacturer:

Hewlett-Packard

Model:

StoreVirtual VSA 2014

Packaged Quantity:

1

Product Line:

HPE

Service & Support

Type:

Technical support

Service & Support Details

Service Availability (Days a Week):

Monday-Friday

Service Availability (Hours a Day):

9 hours a day

Service Type:

Technical support

Service Type:

Phone consulting

Service Type:

New releases update

General

Category:

Utilities

Subcategory:

Utilities - storage virtualization

Product Reviews

Rated 3.9 out of 5 by 15reviewers.

Rated 4 out of 5 by Mehmet Emin The VSA (virtual appliance) version enables us to reuse already installed hardware. Valuable Features:Easy and cheap High Availability is most valuable for us. Also, the VSA (virtual appliance) version enables us to reuse already installed hardware. You do not need to worry about RAID and components anymore, because even a whole chassis loss does not stop this product.Improvements to My Organization:We are able to build server clusters without external storage and still provide high availability. We are able to run the VSA version inside the actual servers, thus converging server and storage in same units.Room for Improvement:The new Quorum Witness function is promising for easier deployment but needs better reliability.Use of Solution:We have been using StoreVirtual solutions since 2010 when it was known as LeftHand.Deployment Issues:We have had no issues with the deployment.Stability Issues:We have had no issues with the stability.Scalability Issues:We have had no issues scaling it.Customer Service:Customer service is outstanding.Technical Support:Technical support is excellent.Previous Solutions:We have used many monolithic and traditional storage systems and all proved to not be highly available with single units. However, StoreVirtual can be split into two, providing you the benefit of redundant active data centers without doubling the cost.Initial Setup:Initial setup is easy, but the differences from traditional storage requires some learning curve. You need to know about managers concept of StoreVirtual. Fortunately newer versions of centralized management console (CMC) provides warnings when you have configurations that would result in reduced availability.Implementation Team:HPE Installation Services are recommended. Since we are an integrator, we provide this.ROI:ROI usually takes about a year.Cost and Licensing Advice:If you think about high availability the product is very cheap because it is an all inclusive offering. You need to buy licenses and two of traditional products compared to StoreVirtual.The VSA version is free for every brand server up to 1TB/node up to three nodes. There is also a 60 day trial for more than 1TB storage. You just need the license key to continue managing the product without reinstalling if you purchase it.Other Advice:It is the only product that provides High Availability without depending on OS multipath I/O. It looks like a single unit from the outside, thus there is no need for failover/failback because all nodes are active. It is like a metro train compared to a classic diesel train, meaning it has an engine in every car. Adding capacity means adding performance because you are adding controllers, too. We can’t say it is the fastest product on the planet, but it is definitely not slow. High Availability means synchronized replication over the network, adding a little latency but providing High Availability.Since it is IP-based, it is important to make sure a network problem does not result in the collapse of storage network. It is best to have redundant switches that do not share the same network as applications. VLANS are definitely recommended.Pay attention to the managers running and make sure your failover manager is not bound to any nodes. A failover manager needs to be alive for smaller clusters to survive complete hardware/network failures. Make sure there is no single point of failure that would result in multiple nodes going down.Disclaimer: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer:We are an HP Gold Partner. We also integrate and provide maintenance for StoreVirtual products. August 16, 2016

Rated 4 out of 5 by Philip Sellers I like that it runs on ProLiant on top of our ESX servers. Valuable Features:We were primarily looking for a storage system for a management cluster that was separate from our fiber channel SAN. Fiber channel SAN is all of our mission critical stuff, but we needed somewhere for our management systems that are watching and monitoring everything. So we were looking for something that was ASCII based. We wanted something that wasn't going to take pre-built hardware because we have two different data centers and a third location where we are trying to spread the data across those locations. The VSA solution was great because it runs on ProLiant alongside of our ESX servers and we were able to get that geographic disbursement of our data while watching our mission critical fiber stuff. It's simple to administer too and it was simple to set up.Room for Improvement:I'd like to see the user interface updated. It's getting kind of long in the tooth, and the user interface makes it look a lot more complex than it actually is to manage, and I think that you can mask a lot of that with a refresh of the user interface. Kind of the same thing that they did with the 3PAR. They upgraded the user interface to an HTML5 application, and to me it makes it a lot easier, simpler to manage, and they could do the same thing for store virtual.Use of Solution:We've got about two years worth of experience with it.Stability Issues:StoreVirtual has been great. We haven't had a failure in two years, and we went through a reconfiguration about three months ago to add some solid state drives to improve the performance, and it works.Scalability Issues:The great thing about that is if we are hitting a performance issue or something, scale is built into that platform, you add additional nodes, you've got additional capacity, you've got additional IOP capabilities across your virtual array. So scaling within StoreVirtual is really kind of easy, just scale it out to another node.Initial Setup:StoreVirtual setup is actually really simple. There are a couple of different ways that you can do it now. You can set it up from intelligent provisioning, which is included on every Proliant server. It will go out to the internet, pull down the bits, and deploy it for you. It's all sort of work-flowed and really simple. If you wanted to, you could pull down the bits yourself and there is a wizard that deploys it. That's also really simple. You have to do a little bit of planning of how you build your rate sets and drive sets and stuff that are going to be underneath it, but it's incredibly easy to deploy, whether you are doing bare metal, or BSA like we are doing.Other Advice:I'd like to see the UI of the Central Management Console updated. It really is pretty simple to deploy, but the older UI makes it look more complicated than it really is. HPE has purpose built solutions utilizing StoreVirtual in its Hyper-Converged and Converged Systems that do a really good job of easily deploying it. Getting that same experience to a user just ordering StoreVirtual would be really nice to have.Disclaimer: IT Central Station contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor. July 4, 2016

Rated 4 out of 5 by Bryan Seminara Using this platform, we were able to provide virtual desktops (VDI) to our end users across WAN, to help alleviate some of the problems that we’ve had with bandwidth. Valuable Features:* Hardware stability* Support* Four-hour response support* PerformanceImprovements to My Organization:Using this platform, we were able to provide virtual desktops (VDI) to our end users across WAN, to help alleviate some of the problems that we’ve had with bandwidth.Room for Improvement:We are experiencing some latency that we’re resolving with HP.Use of Solution:The product has been in place for four months.Deployment Issues:No issues with deployment.Stability Issues:No, the hardware has been good, and the system runs at a pretty low-temperature. We have ordered additional RAM as we need more.Scalability Issues:Not yet. We haven’t made that jump yet, but in a few months we may add additional nodes. It seems simple enough to add additional nodes.Customer Service:10/10.Technical Support:10/10. They have experienced technical staff and work through the problems. They're very helpful.Previous Solutions:This was our first HyperConverged solution.Initial Setup:It was a very smooth setup. We were given a small check-list, we prepared, and then HP came in, set it up, and trained us.Implementation Team:HP came on-site to help set up and train. They were hands on, and the training was good, as the interface is easy enough to be very understandable. The training we had is enough for us to scale out and add additional nodes in the future on our own.ROI:It takes about two years.Cost and Licensing Advice:The initial install cost is expensive, but eventually the cost per user is quite reasonable. The more you scale out, the faster it drops. The original cost per user was $971 for 500 users. The cost goes down to $594, and after 3,000 users, it goes down to $401.Other Solutions Considered:Three of the four solutions we researched were HyperConverged solutions, and there wasn’t the same support and cost as we had from HP. HP was the best for cost savings per performance, year over year. We looked at three other solutions though for our RFP, and we selected HP. We evaluated the cost per user once you scale out.Other Advice:On the software side of things, we’ve had issues with printers. We have a complicated situation on the user side of things too. We were able to get through the issues and limitations by using PowerShell scripting. Having IT resources in-house is a must for more complicated cases.Disclaimer: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions. May 31, 2016

Rated 3 out of 5 by Francis Ma We have the ability to migrate data between clusters within the same management group. We've been unable to customize alerting thresholds. Valuable Features:* The ability to scale out if/when additional capacity is required.* The ability to migrate data between clusters within the same management group.Improvements to My Organization:It hasn't helped as the HP provided software for the host server systems has become a continuous nightmare when it comes to HP LH OS upgrade process with our 260+ systems in multiple management groups/clusters.Room for Improvement:* Inability to customize alerting thresholds.* Un-usability of the HP CMC for HP LH OS upgrade when a newer version is released but not upgraded although the to-be-upgraded version is an older one.* Failure to report on lower-level hardware issue via HP CMC and/or SANMON UI unless checking iLO GUI.* Inability to re-configure/modify iLO settings via HP LH OS.* Multiple HP SANIQ / LH OS upgrade issues, e.g. upgrade resource partition unavailable, especially if the systems have been running for close to or more than a year.* Bug(s) in the HP-provided software for the host server systems not detected/identified by HP QA/QE and caused multiple post software-upgrade outages.* Difficulty on even opening a case due to poor record-keeping of/by HP.Deployment Issues:There have been no issue with the deployment.Stability Issues:We have had numerous issues with the stability that have been enumerated above.Scalability Issues:We have had no issues scaling it.Technical Support:It's 8/10 once we escalate past Tier One, and sometimes even Tier Two.Previous Solutions:We were previously using NetApp for block-based storage requirements. HP StoreVirtual (LeftHand) was selected due to the lower initial purchase (CapEx) and subsequent support (OpEx) costs.Initial Setup:It was reasonably straightforward.Implementation Team:All our HP StoreVirtual (LeftHand) systems are implemented via the vendor teams that handle most of our on-site work followed by in-house Storage Administration team member(s) for additional storage-level configuration.ROI:We have not officially calculated the exact ROI.Cost and Licensing Advice:There's no advice about pricing/licensing as we handle it via an HP VAR, with a contract established with YP, that provides very good pricing/licensing numbers.Other Advice:My advice is to only use HP StoreVirtual (LeftHand) for small-scale and/or per-project deployments via iSCSI (IPSAN) preferably on dedicated network between the host server and the storage systems.Disclaimer: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions. May 5, 2016

Rated 3 out of 5 by hunterdg It allows us the ability to use direct-attached storage of our existing servers for clustered Virtual SAN. The stability needs improvement. Valuable Features:It allows the direct-attached storage of our existing servers to be used for clustered Virtual SAN.Improvements to My Organization:We implemented it into a development environment, but we found that it was not reliable enough to put it into production.Room for Improvement:Management of the system is tedious. Stability needs improvement. The system would work fine for weeks and then one of the VSA virtual machines would hang, taking down the clustered volume. This was very confusing, because I had four nodes, which should have allowed fault-tolerance.Use of Solution:I've been using it for six months.Deployment Issues:I had no issues deploying it.Stability Issues:There were stability issues. See the Areas for Improvement section.Scalability Issues:We didn't scale it beyond four nodes as it never went into production.Technical Support:Support was not helpful, instead advising me to upgrade to a paid version which includes support.Previous Solutions:I have tried StarWind’s VSAN solution, but decided to go with HP VSA because it was included in the purchase price of my HP DL360 G9, approximately $20,000.Initial Setup:The installation and creation of the ‘cluster’ was fairly straightforward. Volume creation and additional required configuration was a bit more complex.Implementation Team:I implemented it myself. I would suggest deploying in a dev environment first, to ensure thorough understanding. It is not exactly intuitive.ROI:I stopped using the product when the VSA volume took itself offline for the second time.Cost and Licensing Advice:I used the free 1TB license that is included with all newer HP servers.Other Advice:Make sure you have more than enough VSA nodes (at least enough to handle a loss of one node and preferably two). Ensure the license supports distributed volumes, rather than single-host volumes.Disclaimer: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions. April 27, 2016

Rated 4 out of 5 by Adrian Lingea While it's a simple system to work with, at the same time it gives a high level of data availability and resilience. Valuable Features:While it's a simple system to work with, at the same time it gives a high level of data availability and resilience. We can utilize our existing hardware and save energy in cooling costs.Improvements to My Organization:HP StoreVirtual added the benefits of a shared storage to a highly-virtualized environment:* Live migration* High availability* Data protection (snapshots)* Better performanceRoom for Improvement:I would like to have the option to configure and get detailed alerts from the Centralized Management Console.Use of Solution:We have used this product since 2010.Deployment Issues:We have had no issues with the deployment.Stability Issues:We have had no stability issues.Scalability Issues:When it was deployed, we were just building our VM environment, and it's scaled out as our needs grew. We've had no issues with being unable to scale.Customer Service:Customer service is brilliant.Technical Support:Technical support is brilliant. HP technical support is great for sorting out the little issues as they arise.Previous Solutions:We did not use a different solution. We chose StoreVirtual as it ticked many boxes in regards to our needs.Initial Setup:The initial setup is straightforward. As long as you have some experience with storage systems, you should be fine.Implementation Team:The implementation was all completed in-house with some input from an HP partner.ROI:I would estimate our ROI to be somewhere around 600%.Other Advice:It’s a good, solid product. Make sure you get the HP care pack as you need it to access updates. If you can’t fit in your budget a hardware SAN, this is a good alternative.Disclaimer: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions. April 24, 2016

Rated 4 out of 5 by Sami Marzouki It gives us the ability to assign Servers/LUNs to a physical/logical site for better access, avoiding high-latency connections. Valuable Features:* Multi-site SAN (near-real-time replication)* Ability to assign Servers/LUNs to a physical/logical site for better access avoiding high-latency connections* Space reclamation* Thin/full provisioning* Maintenance and support is easy to do.* There are two 10GB ports present next to four GB ports, which makes it easy to upgrade the network .Improvements to My Organization:Server provisioning and capacity expansion are much easier than before.Room for Improvement:StoreVirtual should offer QoS per v-disk or ISCSi.Use of Solution:We've been using the 4500 for three years, and the 4730 for one year.Deployment Issues:We had no deployment issues.Stability Issues:There were no issues with the stability.Scalability Issues:We have had no issues scaling it for our needs.Technical Support:9/10 From disk replacement to software support, the response from technical support is always excellent.Previous Solutions:Initially, we used a HP entry level "SAN" HP P2000 G2. It was for our initial virtualization project.Initial Setup:The initial setup was pretty straightforward as HP did a good job providing excellent documentation and best practices.Implementation Team:We implemented it via an in-house service. Testing different workloads on your SAN is a good idea. This helps you to have a comparison point for later users. In case people encounter trouble in production, you can then easily compare performance with the different workloads.Cost and Licensing Advice:Over a period of five years, we created 40-45 VMs. Previously, we had a physical server, storage, and backup solution, which was about $5,000 per server. We made a serious savings compared to the price of the SAN solution.Disclaimer: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions. April 19, 2016

Rated 4 out of 5 by Adrian Marc Creek BSc (Hons) MBCS CITP We like the Multi-site capability for disaster recovery and how it is easy to support. Valuable Features:* Multi-site capability for disaster recovery* Application aware snapshots* Enterprise solution for virtualisation* Centralised and easy to use management* Easy to support whether it is four or 40 storage nodesImprovements to My Organization:Business continuity and disaster recovery. The storage environment is spread between two geographical locations – bi-annually BCP/DR tests are conducted proving the validity of the architecture. Each site in turn simulates power loss – both the compute and storage that supports the vSphere estate are affected. In all cases, these tests have been 100% successful.Room for Improvement:It needs further improvements in terms of reporting from the CMC, specifically more detailed alerting from the CMC.Use of Solution:We've been using it for five years. We're currently running SANi/Q versions 10.5 and LeftHand OS version 12.5.Deployment Issues:We have had no issues with the deployment.Stability Issues:We have had no issues with the stability.Scalability Issues:There have been issues with adding further nodes to existing management groups and clusters. The volume re-syncing and re-striping caused some performance issues. With version 9.5 of the OS there were high numbers of disk failures – these appear to have been resolved as we progressed through versions 11.5 to 12.5.Technical Support:Technical support is excellent. I have great experiences in dealing with technical support. Generally, the product is so intuitive (to people appropriately skilled to manage storage) that HP support is only really required when low-level shell-type access is required or when a major bug has been detected.Previous Solutions:EMC CLARiiON, IBM DS 4000 series – HP LeftHand presented a more rounded and mature storage solution.Initial Setup:The initial setup was very straightforward. The CMC logically guides you through the setup and configuration process. This does negate the requirement to plan the implementation, but even if you choose not to use the wizard and manually configure management groups, cluster groups, FOM instances, etc., the CMC lets you know what needs to be completed first.Implementation Team:The implementation was all completed in-house with some limited input from the vendor partner group.My advice – plan your installation, think about your geography, consider what the technology can do for you, think about the networking, consider that like any storage, it works well plugged into the high end backbone and not just available ports on some local access switch.If you fail to think about the connectivity correctly, performance can be affected. Finally, latency is king, so keep your eye on the performance monitor within the CMC.ROI:The HP product is end-of-life, and the cost for licensing is considerable but necessary. HP support for breaks as fixes are required. Low-level and shell access requires an HP engineer because passwords required are not given out to customers. If you don’t procure the HP care packs for your P4000 estate, you cannot download or gain access to updates, i.e. OS updates, BIOS, firmware, etc.Other Solutions Considered:I am currently considering Tintri VAS and Nimble as well as reviewing certain hyper-converged technologies such as SimpliVity and Nutanix.Other Advice:Ensure you have the right skills – general administration is straight forward but Virtual Connect configuration requires knowledge.Disclaimer: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions. March 27, 2016